I own a business (sole prop)
I work full time, for 9 months of 2020 at a kubota dealer and the last 3 months at a powersports dealer which I am still at.
The kubota dealer took a big loan, supposedly to help pay their employees. They have 53 employees including the owners and their kids-who have never done anything (well except one of the kids) for the company other than suck up funds. Trust me when I say this, but the chain of dealers was making money hand over fist withOUT any loans. It was a booming year. Yet the workers didn't see a dime of a payroll increase, myself included. Last pay increase was 2012. Hence, one of many reasons I left. I still stay in touch with one of the other employees that I worked with. The corporation took about $2M in loans last year. The dealer I worked for did nothing for building/facilities improvements that they kept promising to do. They sent the money WE (workers) made for them to other dealers of the chain that are failing--and it begs the question why are they failing? Because they hired their friends to run them...drunks/crackheads/etc. When I worked at the Kubota shop, it was a daily occurrence--where someone would show up or call, saying that they were at one of the other dealers in our chain and didn't care for the service they received. Every day 5 days a week, sometimes several times a day. There was good reason that we (at the dealer I worked at) stayed busy. Experience, professionalism, and we worked our butts off. That don't mean there weren't problems that popped up sometimes.
New job is a small business, 9 of us total including the boss and his wife. Great folks, real down to earth. They took no loans. I mentioned it to them the other day that the old workplace took $2M and they said they took nothing because 2020 was a booming year for sales and income-which is why I got a good Christmas bonus. I was shocked at Christmas time to see that I got the same bonus that I had gotten in the prior 20 years at the other place. Usually when you start a new job a couple months before Christmas, generally speaking you don't get much and I expected that. So far 2021 has also been a banner year for sales, we can't get enough product to keep up with demand. That is a good problem to have. 2021 models are already sold completely out and 2022's are in production, so there is a big gap there. Prior year models typically still ship until about August or early Sept on most years, but they were sold out of 21's in early May. I'm in the service side of things and I can tell you that service has also been extremely blessed. I like to say busy and with the exception of the snow storm, I have been plenty busy--even though I'm inexperienced with product in comparison to Kubota. But I still work on a Kubota or two, working at a place for almost 3 decades and leaving suddenly, your loyal clients tend to follow you. I look at that as a blessing. Some might call it a curse.
And the new job-I just got a call from the owner (who I'd consider a friend) that the business is going to do up a theme bike for SEMA, and I'm asked to do a lot of the fab work here at the house, also boss says he's paying for my way to Vegas in November. The Kubota place NEVER did that (ever) in the 3 decades I worked for them. SEMA--is a dream come true for me, a hotrodder, an enthusiast. I've never had the time off or funds to go until now. Boss says he'll pay "us" (home business) very well to do this, says he has a $150,000 all inclusive budget. I know it goes quick but I also know that $150,000 is a chunk of money when it comes to powersports equipment. I'm beside myself. Humbled and honored.
On my own I also didn't apply for PPP loan. With a full time job it really wasn't needed, yet there were probabaly other businesses that could benefit much more than I so I left it alone. I qualified according to the accountant, just chose not to. Restaurant a couple miles from here took $2.5M, which is more than their annual income--I don't know how all that works but $2.5M will buy their entire restaurant, land, and all the assets about twiced. Maybe they have more than just the one place, I dunno. So I guess the PPP I didn't take went to them, or whatever. I hope they used it wisely.